Otters file for bankruptcy . . . .

The Erie Otters filed for bankruptcy one day before facing the London Knights in an OHL second-round playoff series.

The move is intended to deke around the Edmonton Oilers, who are trying to force a sale of the junior hockey club in Pennsylvania.

"This will have absolutely no effect on Otters playoff games, on our staff, on our players, or any of our hockey or business operations," team owner and GM Sherry Bassin told the Erie Times-News Wednesday. "The team, the Ontario Hockey League and our corporate partners will be fully protected during this process."

The Otters, as Bassin has long contended, remain for sale.

The Oilers claim to have loaned the team $4.6 million in an agreement that would allow them to purchase the team. When that deal fell through, Edmonton sued Erie, but a judge in U.S. district court dismissed that lawsuit in December.

The filing of this Chapter 11 petition guards the Otters against the Oilers, through subsidiary "Ontario Major Junior Hockey Corp.," from conducting a sale of the Erie team's assets under the Uniform Commercial Code of Pennsylvania.

"It is Erie Hockey Club's intention to conclude the sale process in Chapter 11, which will allow the sale to proceed in an orderly manner and without interference," an Otters statement said.

And if that's not enough, there is added drama to this legal tug-of-war.

The struggling on-ice Oilers are among a handful of NHL teams with a chance to pick either Erie captain Connor McDavid or Dylan Strome in the draft this summer.